Plan B Forum

Thousands protest Trump as 'sister marches' begin in Australia and New Zealand

Thousands of protesters in Australia and New Zealand on Saturday joined the first of hundreds of womens' marches organized around the world in a show of disapproval of U.S. President Donald Trump as he began his first day in office.

In Sydney, Australia's biggest city, about 3,000 people - men and women gathered for a rally in Hyde Park before marching on the U.S. consulate downtown, while organizers said 5,000 people rallied in Melbourne.

"Feminism is my Trump card" and "Fight like a girl," were among the placards held aloft by the protesters in Sydney.

"We’re not marching as an anti-Trump movement per se, we’re marching to protest the hate speech, the hateful rhetoric, the misogyny, the bigotry, the xenophobia and we want to present a united voice with women around the globe," organizer Mindy Freiband told Reuters.

Many of the protesters in Sydney and Melbourne wore pink hats, that activists referred to as their "pussyhats".

The emergence of a 2005 tape in which Trump spoke of women in a demeaning way sparked widespread outrage and was one of the low points of his election campaign. In the tape he was heard saying: "Grab them by the pussy. You can do anything." [nL1N1F40DT]

In New Zealand, there were marches in four cities, involving around 2,000 people, Wellington's march organizer Bette Flagler told Reuters by phone.

lsewhere in Asia, hundreds of people joined protests

in Tokyo, including many American expatriates.

"Trump presidency gets my blood boiling ... Everything we value could be gone. It's time to speak your mind and concerns and to do our best to salvage the values we cherish in America," said Bill Scholer, an art teacher.

And in Manila on Friday about 200 demonstrators from a Philippine nationalist group rallied for about an hour against Trump outside the U.S. embassy in Manila.

Some held up signs demanding U.S. troops leave the Philippines while others set fire to a paper U.S. flag bearing a picture of Trump's face..

Worldwide some 673 "sister marches" are planned for Saturday, in addition to a protest in Washington D.C., according to the organizers' website which says more than two million marchers are expected.

In Washington D.C., at Trump's inauguration back-clad activists, who were not related to the womens’ marches, threw rocks and bottles at police in Washington as Trump was sworn in as President.

Although protests in the United States are common at inaugurations, in living memory only the inauguration of Richard Nixon in 1968 - as the United States fought an unpopular war in Vietnam - has drawn such a strong reaction worldwide.

The Trumpanzee has no fucking clue what he has unleashed.

Lord Jim wrote: (I wonder how many of the hundreds of thousands marching and rallying today couldn't be bothered to show up to vote last November...)

Would-be protesters heading to the Women’s March on Washington have said they were denied entry to the United States after telling border agents at a land crossing in Quebec their plans to attend the march.

Montrealer Sasha Dyck was part of a group of eight who had arranged online to travel together to Washington. Divided into two cars, the group – six Canadians and two French nationals – arrived at the border crossing that connects St Bernard de Lacolle in Quebec with Champlain, New York, on Thursday.

The group was upfront about their plans with border agents, Dyck said. “We said we were going to the women’s march on Saturday and they said, ‘Well, you’re going to have to pull over’.”

What followed was a two-hour ordeal. Their cars were searched and their mobile phones examined. Each member of the group was fingerprinted and had their photo taken.

Border agents first told the two French citizens that they had been denied entry to the US and informed them that any future visit to the US would now require a visa.

“Then for the rest of us, they said, ‘You’re headed home today’,” Dyck said. The group was also warned that if they tried to cross the border again during the weekend, they would be arrested. “And that was it, they didn’t give a lot of justification.”

Dyck described it as a sharp contrast to 2009, when the research nurse made the same journey to attend Barack Obama’s inauguration. “I couldn’t even get in for this one, whereas at the other one, the guy at the border literally gave me a high five when I came in and everybody was just like, ‘welcome’. The whole city was partying; nobody was there to protest Obama the first time.”

UK national Joe Kroese said he, a Canadian and two Americans were held at the same border crossing for three hours on Thursday.

The group had travelled from Montreal, where 23-year-old Kroese is studying, and had explained to border agents that they were considering attending the Women’s March but had yet to finalise their plans.

After being questioned, fingerprinted and photographed, Kroese and his Canadian companion were refused entry because they were planning to attend what the border agent called a “potentially violent rally”, he said. The pair was advised not to travel to the United States for a few months, and Kroese was told he would now need a visa to enter the US.

After an attempted crossing late Thursday, Montreal resident Joseph Decunha said he was also turned away. He and the two Americans he was with told the border agent that they were planning to attend the inauguration and the women’s march.

Trump's first 24 hours bring global protests, a dark speech and uncertainty

The group was brought in for secondary processing, where the border agent asked about their political views, Decunha told the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. “The first thing he asked us point blank is, ‘Are you anti- or pro-Trump?’”

After being fingerprinted and photographed he was told that his two friends could enter the US, but that he could not. “They told me I was being denied entry for administrative reasons. According to the agent, my travelling to the United States for the purpose of protesting didn’t constitute a valid reason to cross,” Decunha said.

He described the experience – particularly the questions he fielded about his political beliefs – as concerning. “It felt like, if we had been pro-Trump, we would have absolutely been allowed entry.”

US Customs and Border Protection said it could not discuss individual cases, citing privacy reasons. “We recognize that there is an important balance to strike between securing our borders while facilitating the high volume of legitimate trade and travel that crosses our borders every day, and we strive to achieve that balance and show the world that the United States is a welcoming nation,” it said in an email to the Guardian.

On a daily basis, more than 1 million individuals are admitted into the United States at its air, land and sea ports, the agency noted. An average of 600 people a day – less than a tenth of 1% of those admitted – are denied entry for a varied list of reasons that include prohibited activities or intent as well as national security concerns.

Guinevere wrote:The Trumpanzee has no fucking clue what he has unleashed.

We barely got to march in Boston (1/4 of the city population was jammed on the Common and surrounding streets). DC and Chicago were so crowded they couldn't march either. Women marched in Antarctica.

I'm so proud of my sisters, and our brothers who marched with us.